Thesis--University of Wisconsin--Madison. / Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 263-265).

"Dissertation zur Erlangung der Doctorwürde.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Chicago, 1913. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references. Also available on the Internet.

Th. 3e cycle--Litt. fr. et comp.--Rennes 2, 1985.

From Introduction: This thesis then is a detailed study of Lessing's novels in an attempt to show her development as a writer. Her short stories are handled briefly in connection with her novels. For, although the short stories are among her finest work, focus on the novels is sufficient to show her growth as a writer. Hers is the small individual struggle to overcome the limitations of both her content and her form. To overcome the limitations of her content means expanding her own consciousness and re-forming life itself. Only when she is free and the world is free can she overcome the limitations of her content. Then, of course, she need no longer and can no longer write. The task seems as impossible as that of the dung beetles, but she nevertheless continues. Like the sacred beetles with "the sun between their feet" she carries on rolling the muck of the world into symbols of the truth.

This study of six novels by three post-World War II British novelists deals with the philosophical and pragmatic aspects of intimate relationship. Raymond Williams, in The English Novel from Dickens to Lawrence, establishes that novelists were among the first to recognise the destruction of the old community by industrialism. Without an alternate conception of community, industrial capitalism imposes itself directly upon the individual, and thus sets harsh limits upon the relationships he or she can create. One result is the alienation that Karl Marx described as inherent in the marketplaceosociety underpinning Victorian culture; or, in another idiom, the possessive individualism perceived by C.B. MacPherson. The increasing commercialism of society—the propensity, as Adam Smith phrased it, to truck and barter—has encouraged possessiveness, and has debased and alienated the most intimate aspects of human existence, especially sex and love. Sex is a central expression of the essence of life, and hence sexual relationships are adversely affected when they are alienated from love and community. As in the commercial transaction, intimacy in these six novels is vulnerable to the manipulation and the exploitation of one person by another, because there is no willingness to become involved in a reciprocal relationship. This commentary on the novels of John Fowles, Doris Lessing, and David Storey suggests some tentative conclusions about intimacy in the latter part of the 20th century. The working class novels generally emphasise traditional relationships; and tell us that individuals who try to discard them (as with Clegg in The Collector, and Machin in This Sporting Life), will lose £or never win) those whom they love. The emphasis upon money alienates them from their basic community, and destroys their integrity. There is no intimacy divorced from the primary social relationship. Middle class protagonists move away from community as they become dominant in a marketplace society. Their success transforms- them into alienated and possessive individualists; and their belated attempt to restore a sense of intimacy is an effort—perhaps tragic—to become whole in a fragmented world. But the relationships occur in a vacuum. Either they fail, as in The Golden Notebook, or the individuals reject intimacy, and flee forward from community into a super-individualism as with Martha Quest in The Four-Gated City. These novels tell us nothing of a social movement that will give the individual a sense of purpose or meaning: hence the individuals remain isolated, and seem to lose substance. When Leonard Radcliffe, for example (Radcliffe), murders his community out of his need for an absolute, he precipitates his own death. Again, Charles Smithson and Sarah Woodruff in The French Lieutenant1s Woman lose their vitality and sexual commitment because Sarah is more concerned to preserve her individuality. These examples serve to show that temporary and partial relationships are lethal to the spirit. The loss of intimacy is the result, in the end, of the loss of the moral sense. The displacement of the religious impulse to wholeness (the "disappearance of God") leaves one with the hollow victories of possessive individualism in a fragmented society. / Arts, Faculty of / English, Department of / Graduate

Note:

Resumo: O trabalho enfatiza o pensamento de Lessing no seu limiar sobre a teoria da tragédia, singularizando o conceito de compaixão e a fundamentação desse elemento no contexto trágico segundo a Poética de Aristóteles. Para tanto, é proposta uma tradução das Briefwechsel über das Trauerspiel (Cartas sobre a Tragédia), onde Lessing desenvolve diálogos epistolares com Christoph Friedrich Nicolai e Moses Mendelssohn na formação de conceitos sobre a poética do trágico. Conclui com a tarefa de reflexão crítica capaz de estabelecer uma concepção filosófica da tragédia. / The work emphasizes Lessing\'s thought on his threshold on the theory of tragedy, singling out the concept of compassion and the grounding of this element in the tragic context according to Aristotle\'s Poetics. Therefore, a translation of the Briefwechsel über das Trauerspiel (Letters on Tragedy) is proposed where Lessing develops epistolary dialogues with Christoph Friedrich Nicolai and Moses Mendelssohn to build on concepts about the poetics of the tragic. Finally, it ends with a critical reflection capable of establishing a philosophical conception of tragedy.

Resumo: O trabalho enfatiza o pensamento de Lessing no seu limiar sobre a teoria da tragédia, singularizando o conceito de compaixão e a fundamentação desse elemento no contexto trágico segundo a Poética de Aristóteles. Para tanto, é proposta uma tradução das Briefwechsel über das Trauerspiel (Cartas sobre a Tragédia), onde Lessing desenvolve diálogos epistolares com Christoph Friedrich Nicolai e Moses Mendelssohn na formação de conceitos sobre a poética do trágico. Conclui com a tarefa de reflexão crítica capaz de estabelecer uma concepção filosófica da tragédia. / The work emphasizes Lessing\'s thought on his threshold on the theory of tragedy, singling out the concept of compassion and the grounding of this element in the tragic context according to Aristotle\'s Poetics. Therefore, a translation of the Briefwechsel über das Trauerspiel (Letters on Tragedy) is proposed where Lessing develops epistolary dialogues with Christoph Friedrich Nicolai and Moses Mendelssohn to build on concepts about the poetics of the tragic. Finally, it ends with a critical reflection capable of establishing a philosophical conception of tragedy.

Diderot et Lessing participent au débat esthétique central du 18e siècle, celui de la notion d’illusion dans les arts visuels. Diderot voit le signe esthétique sous un aspect énergétique, alors que Lessing reste fidèle au modèle rhétorique. Par conséquent deux formes du théâtre des Lumières s’établissent, pour Diderot celui du tableau, pour Lessing celui de l’action. Sur cet arrière-plan, l‘étude offre une comparaison typologique des dramaturgies des deux auteurs.Les raisons expliquant les définitions bien différentes de l’image sur scène sont à rechercher dans les jugements d‘un monde devenu contingent. Diderot favorise un matérialisme scientifique, les anciennes valeurs éternelles sont soumises à un dynamisme de relativité. Lessing s’oriente vers une notion de vérité d’origine chrétienne. L’analyse comparatiste intègre non seulement ces images de l’ordre du monde, mais aussi des aspects d’une sémiotique du théâtre.L’étude établit avec une comparaison entre le Laokoon de Lessing et les Essais sur la peinture de Diderot une première terminologie d’analyse. Le choix des textes reflète ensuite le développement des deux auteurs par rapport à l’image sur scène. Sont examinés d’abord Le Fils naturel et Le Père de famille avec leurs textes annexes. Après nous présentons les idées de la Correspondance sur la tragédie que Lessing mène avec ses amis avant sa traduction des textes mentionnés de Diderot. Des analyses de la Dramaturgie de Hambourg et de Emilia Galotti font comprendre la position de Lessing face au théâtre de Diderot. Le dernier chapitre oppose en résumé Nathan der Weise comme utopie du théâtre à la vision du jeu sur scène décrite dans le Paradoxe sur le comédien. / Diderot and Lessing both participate in the central aesthetic debate of the 18th century: the concept of illusion in the visual arts. Diderot views the sign as an energetic entity, while Lessing favours the rhetoric model. This results in two forms of theatre of Enlightenment: Diderot’s form is that of the tableau, for Lessing the plot remains crucial. With this in mind Lessing’s and Diderot’s different approaches to drama are compared in a typological way.Reasons for the two orientations are anchored in different assessments of a world of contingence. Diderot presents a scientific materialism. The ancient eternal values are exposed to a dynamic of relativity. Lessing adopts a notion of truth based on Christian values. The analysis integrates not only these sights of world order but also reflections of theatrical semiotics. The dissertation begins with a comparison of Lessing’s Laokoon and Diderot’s Essais sur la peinture and highlights the different approaches towards the aesthetic debate. The choice of text then follows the development of both authors in relation to visuality. Thus Le Fils naturel and Le Père de famille with their annexes are analized. Next, Lessing’s ideas about theatre in the Briefwechsel über das Trauerspiel, a correspondence with his friends before his translation of Diderot’s texts mentioned above, are outlined. How Lessing’s position differs from Diderot’s is further depicted through an analysis of the Hamburgische Dramturgie and Emilia Galotti. By way of resume the final chapter presents Nathan der Weise as a utopia of theatre in contrast to the paradox vision of stage illusion in the Paradoxe sur le comédien.